Alien Life
Life Elsewhere In Solar System Could Be Different From Life As We Know It
Science & Technology
The search for life elsewhere in the solar system and beyond should include efforts to detect what scientists sometimes refer to as “weird” life - that is, life with an alternative biochemistry to that of life on Earth - says a new report from the National Research Council.
Washington, D.C. - infoZine - The committee that wrote the report found that the fundamental requirements for life as we generally know it - a liquid water biosolvent, carbon-based metabolism, molecular system capable of evolution, and the ability to exchange energy with the environment - are not the only ways to support phenomena recognized as life. “Our investigation made clear that life is possible in forms different than those on Earth,” said committee chair John Baross, professor of oceanography at the University of Washington, Seattle.
The report emphasizes that “no discovery that we can make in our exploration of the solar system would have greater impact on our view of our position in the cosmos, or be more inspiring, than the discovery of an alien life form, even a primitive one. At the same time, it is clear that nothing would be more tragic in the American exploration of space than to encounter alien life without recognizing it.”
Here’s the remainder of the article.
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Jul 18 2007 
July 18th, 2007 at 7:36 pm
“no discovery that we can make in our exploration of the solar system would have greater impact on our view of our position in the cosmos, or be more inspiring, than the discovery of an alien life form, even a primitive one. At the same time, it is clear that nothing would be more tragic in the American exploration of space than to encounter alien life without recognizing it.”
you gotta wonder if this has already happened…
July 19th, 2007 at 3:23 pm
What about the experiments conducted by the Viking program?
From Wikipedia:
“The Viking landers conducted biological experiments designed to detect life in the Martian soil if it existed with experiments designed by three separate teams, under the direction of chief scientist Gerald Soffen of NASA. The results were initially positive and one experiment met all NASA’s criteria for the detection of life. But, based on the results of another test that failed to reveal any organic molecules in the soil, most scientists became convinced that the results were likely caused by a nonbiological chemical reaction. However, the matter is still under debate and some recent research adds support to the biological interpretation.”
Maybe the powers at be didn’t feel the public was ready for the impact of finding life elsewhere in the solar system. Maybe all this time they have prepared us for the news (revealing the existence of great quantities of water in Mars in the distant past, then saying water might still be present in Mars underneath the surface), and it will be eventually released in the next NASA missions.